CHAPTER 45: CHAPTER 45: END OF THE CITY UNDERGROUND MAZE, UNDERGROUND WITCH

[You have killed x5 "Underground Dwellers (Level 23)"]

[You have gained 100,000 experience points.]

[You have gained 74 Lives!]

---

"Phew," Stark exhaled, grinning. "Decent enough."

His XP bar glowed near the edge of another level up.

Only a sliver remained before twenty-one. Close. Very close.

But he didn’t waste time staring at the bar.

Hand of Avarice!

Fwish!

The spectral hand burst from his staff, long and bony, reaching toward the corpses of the fallen dwellers.

Its claws tore into their husks, extracting the loot.

Ding!

[You have gained 68 Lives!]

"Alright."

He expected nothing else. Just lives, the same as usual.

But then—

Ding!

[You have gained 14 Lives!]

"Huh?"

Stark blinked. The second panel wasn’t normal.

Fourteen lives wasn’t much, but the fact that it had appeared at all told him everything.

’So my theory was right.’ His grin sharpened.

His [Hand of Avarice] at mythical-rank gave him a 125% loot chance.

That meant a guaranteed extra drop, and an additional 25% chance to trigger yet another.

The first panel was the 100%.

The second? That was the bonus rolling in his favor.

"Good. Very good."

The dwellers hadn’t dropped items this time, but that didn’t matter.

Either way, his eyes were on the boss at the end of the maze.

He adjusted his staff, barrier still shimmering faintly around him.

The traps hadn’t let up, so keeping [Powerful Magic Barrier] up at all times was just common sense.

He pressed forward into the maze.

An hour passed.

The maze stretched on forever.

Corridor after corridor, wall after wall, twisting turns, and countless dead ends.

The traps kept coming, spike floors, poison darts, collapsing walls, but Stark’s barrier tanked them all.

He didn’t even flinch.

BOOM! CLANG! FWIP!

All background noise.

’This place is a grind,’ he thought. ’But as long as the XP keeps flowing, I don’t care.’

He slaughtered more dwellers and even a few [Maze Spirits], translucent figures that floated in the air like glowing wraiths.

They weren’t strong, but they swarmed. Easy XP. Easy lives.

By the time he finally saw a massive stone gate at the end of the maze, his notifications had already piled up.

Ding!

---

[Congratulations, you have leveled up to Level 21 + Level 22!]

[You have gained 10 points in all of your attributes, and 10 free points to distribute.]

[You have gained 2 Evolution Points!]

[You have gained 289 Lives!]

---

"Damn."

[Free Points to Allocate: 35.]

Stark nodded.

His free points had been stacking without him paying attention.

Thirty-five unallocated. That was enough to tilt a fight hard in his favor if he dumped them all at once.

’Always more,’ he thought, pushing forward.

The real challenge wasn’t behind him. It was through the gate.

He stepped up to the stone doors.

The moment he crossed the threshold—

BOOM!

Blue fire exploded out of nowhere, slamming against his barrier.

Sparks cascaded off the shield as the flames pulled together in the middle of the room, shaping into a figure.

A robed woman. Flames danced across her blue robe, the symbols of fire glowing along its fabric.

A crooked staff burned at its tip. She wore a pointed mage’s hat, shadows hiding her face except for glowing pinprick eyes.

Her power echoed as her body finished forming.

’Here we go,’ Stark thought, gripping his staff tighter.

---

[Underground Witch (Level 24)]

[Rank: Epic (Boss)]

[HP: 200,000]

---

The biggest HP pool he had seen yet in this life.

Twice that of the [Undead Soul Mage]. And this one specialized in fire magic, if the aura around her was any sign.

"Failure..." the witch whispered with a dark smirk.

"So you can talk too," Stark mumbled, "But that won’t save you."

He lifted his staff instantly.

Cataclysmic Fireball!

Fwish!

The blazing sphere ripped through the air, targeting her directly. She raised her own staff.

Blue Flame Barrier!

A shimmering wall of azure fire snapped into existence.

BOOOOM!

The explosion shook the chamber.

But her barrier shattered under the pressure, and the fireball continued forward, slamming into her body.

-31,050!

Stark raised a brow. His skill should have hit for 46,050.

But that meant the barrier must’ve absorbed around fifteen thousand before breaking.

In contrast to such a weakness, Stark’s own barrier at least didn’t have that.

If something hit his barrier for 99,999 damage, it would block all of it, then vanish.

No leftover damage carried over.

That pretty much means getting a free immunity.

’Her defense isn’t as good as mine,’ he thought.

The witch staggered, smoke curling off her robe.

"What...?" she muttered.

She pointed her staff again, blue fire gathering at its tip.

But Stark was faster.

Sovereign Vines! Plague Crystals! Storm of Lightning!

Vines lashed out, crystals burst in sickly green mist, and lightning bolts rained from above.

-38,025! -15,000! -6,000! -6,000! -36,840!

Her HP bar dropped by half in less than a second.

The witch tried to respond, but her body locked up.

["Underground Witch" has been stunned!]

Her eyes widened. "Seriously...?"

Stark didn’t give her the chance to recover.

Cataclysmic Fireball!

Another fireball screamed across the chamber. This time, no barrier stopped it.

BOOOM!

-46,050!

The witch roared as flames engulfed her body.

When she broke free of the stun, she immediately countered.

Blue Flame! Flame Chains!

Azure fire whips cracked through the air.

Chains lashed at Stark’s barrier.

They burned bright, but they weren’t strong enough.

CLANG! CLANG!

Numbers flashed, but his shield handled all of it.

And even if he didn’t have it, he could have easily dodged this attacks.

He pushed forward, chaining spell after spell.

The witch tried to fight back, but she was too slow. Too predictable.

If it was against another mage, Stark was absolutely confident he would win.

No mage-type monster in his range could beat him now.

After a minute, her HP bar dropped to zero.

The witch froze, flames erupting around her body.

Her shadowed face tilted toward him.

"Truly... fascinating..." she whispered.

Then she burst into blue fire, her body turning to ash.

Only her small mage hat clattered to the ground.

Ding!

---

[You have killed "Underground Witch (Level 24 Epic-Rank Boss)."]

[You have gained 150,000 experience points.]

[Congratulations, you have leveled up to Level 23!]

[You have gained 5 points in all of your attributes, and 5 free points to distribute.]

[You have gained 15 Evolution Points!]

[You have gained 130 Lives!]

---

Stark smirked, satisfied.

"Good haul."

One more level and he’d be twenty-four.

Two more, and he’d hit his target: twenty-five before the first event.

But as the panels faded, he paused. Something was off.

"Wait a minute."

He raised his staff.

Hand of Avarice!

Fwish!

The spectral hand shot out, its claws reaching for the witch’s remains.

But there was nothing there to grasp. The hand hovered for a moment, flickered, then dissolved.

Ding!

["Hand of Avarice" has failed.]

"As I thought," Stark muttered.

Her body hadn’t left a corpse. She had disintegrated entirely into flame.

Without a corpse, the hand couldn’t extract loot.

First time it had failed since it reached 100% success rate.

He filed the thought away. Some bosses wouldn’t drop corpses.

He’d need to remember that for the future.

Still, even without loot, the victory was worth it.

Fifteen EP. A level up. And proof that he could stomp an epic-ranked mage boss at this level.

He tightened his grip on his staff, stepping over the witch’s ashes.